Your list of states in the "inflexibly conservative" column, and your cavalier dismissal of them, conveniently (for your theory) neglects the fact that several of them were carried by a Democrat in the 90s presidential elections, and that most of them had at least one Democratic senator during that time. I'm afraid that doesn't speak too strongly for your presumption of a monolithic obstructionist Republican bloc. And to assume that you need to unseat them is nonsense - all it takes is enough vocal citizens in those states making it clear that they will not tolerate more of the same gridlock. A little healthy fear of losing re-election (goaded by recent precedents in the last several contests) might go a long way toward moderating some of their positions.

So you are saying that you believe the accusations Bill Clinton's political opponents leveled - even though $millions were spent on trying to uncover anything prosecutable and nothing came out?

Interesting. Aren't you afraid that this makes you very manipulable by simply the loudest accusation in the room?

Clinton carried those states for POTUS. But voting for POTUS vs voting for a senior senator are two different things - though your point is legitimate.

A block of vocal citizens is not enough. They have to be a danger to the Senator's re-electability. Because for every progressive voice that will be heard, at least 1 conservative "gridlock" voice will be heard as well.

There is no moving the core 35+ conservative Senators to join anything meaningful the Dems would want to do, Obama, Clinton or the return of FDR and JFK notwithstanding.

You choose to see it that way; if Hillary is nominated, you will probably be right, as her presence will certainly energize enough wingnuts to keep those "core" senators in office. I choose the possibility that Obama will bring different people to the polls (already happening), convince at least some Republicans to vote for him (I'm one), and change the political calculus to create something other than gridlock. Incompatible and apparently unbudging positions, both of us, so I guess we'll have to agree to disagree.

Craig Livingstone had the files of 700 people authorized to have access to the White House. Where do you think he got the list of names? It came from a list handed to him by the Bush transition team. They were not political opponents.

The files had previously been pulled by whoever the Craig Livingstone for Bush had been.

Who can say that Bush is not conducting wiretaps of people who are opponents. There is no oversight. That is the problem. There is the possibility that the warrantless wiretaps could be misused. That is the whole reason for the requirement that a court has to issue a warrant.

The fact is that the people on that list of 700 had signed authorization for the White House to review their records or do a background check when they requested access. That would have been a matter of course. The places where I have had to sign such documents do not include an expiration date on them.

Your assertion that the Clinton's did something wrong means that you extend mistakes on the part of any administration member, even the security guard, can be blamed on the Clintons. That is fine as long as you realize how screwed up practically every member of the Bush administration has been. We've had the political appointee who went to jail for shoplifting at the local Target store. Then there is the guy who made the decision to disband the Iraqi army and created an instant recruiting pool of 250,000 armed and trained soldiers for the insurgents to hire from.